MikeMDESMA9

Week 4: Art, Medicine, Technology The common ancestor between this weeks topics of Art, Medicine, and Technology is curiosity. Humans have always been obsessively curious about the workings of the human body. Professor Vensa stated in her lecture that “human dissection marks point where art and medicine really combined”. Human dissection created a better understanding of the workings that led to medical advances like Andreas Vesalius’ book “De humani corporis fabrica”. As medical technology advanced, artists were inspired by the new understanding and technology. ORLAN reading during one of her performances. ORLAN would read aloud during her surgeries as part of her performance art. One of these artists is ORLAN. ORLAN used plastic surgery on herself as a part of her body performance art. ORLAN used her body as a canvas and surgeons knives as her brush. In one performance, she took the most beautiful aspects of women in famous classical paintings. For instance...

Linda Weintraub’s lecture On Tuesday night, I attended Linda Weintraub’s lecture at the Broad Art Center. Weintraub spoke on the randomness of nature, eco materialism and contemporary art. While I did enjoy her own work presented later in the lecture, this blog will focus more on the artists Weintraub presented towards the beginning of her lecture. Selfie I took at the conclusion of the lecture. This was during the questions portion. At the top is the timestamp of when I took the photo. Weintraub presented many different artists and with each one discussed the idea of artists being separated from their art. Maybe because I just had never thought of separation between art and artist or maybe because she started off talking about drone strikes, but I was fascinated by her presentation. I remember Weintraub used this photo for her slideshow, but I didn't get a photo of it. Notice the total disconnect between the subject of the photo and how it is viewed. T...

The emergence of mass media has altered human history and culture. The power of mass media originated with the invention of the printing press. For the first time in history, printed works were able to be mass produced and distributed. As the power and importance of movable text became apparent, technologies that could easily distribute information large groups advanced. Each new media technology revolutionized communication and increased the effect media has on society.  From here I will focus on two aspects of society media effects; Art and Culture Culture Marshall McLuhan believed that the invention of movable type “was the decisive moment in the change from a culture in which all the senses partook of a common interplay to a tyranny of the visual.” McLuhan is referring to how the emergence of media like newspapers, film, radio, and photography shifted our culture to one dominated by visual stimulation. Currently, our culture is completely dominat...

Art and Math have a symbiotic relationship. Both fields are closely related and intertwined in their origins and development. Similarly, math and science are also closely related. Math and science both have a right and wrong answer, while art is open to the artist’s interpretation. On the surface it may not seem that art, math, and science could be closely related, but upon further examination it becomes obvious. Al-Haytham:  Father of modern physical optics One of the earliest examples of the connection between art and math comes from the medieval scholar Al-Haytham. Al-Haytham wrote a book called “The Book of Optics” that transformed how light and vision were understood. Al-Haytham’s work had a major influence on later renaissance artists especially in the revolution of proportion and perspective. One of these renaissance painters was Brunelleschi who used mathematical formulas and principles to scale and add depth to his works. Alberti wrote “De Pictura” which comb...

In CP Snow’s The Two Cultures; and A Second Look, Snow presents two statements that he believes should hold equal importance: "I know what the Second Law of Thermodynamics is" and "I have read a play of Shakespeare’s”. Although I understand his point of view, I believe that Art and Science cannot shouldn’t exist completely together to form one culture. To achieve the ideal “Third Culture” that Victoria Vesna refers to in her work titled Toward a Third Culture: Being in Between , Art and Science must instead live alongside one an another in a mutually beneficial relationship. This idea draws striking similarities to our current polarized political landscape. I am truly a centrist; believing in right wing fiscal policies and left wing social policies. I believe that my political views are similar to Vesna’s “Third Culture”. With the election of President Trump and the subsequent backlash from the left, it only reinforces the idea of two separated cultures. Ju...